A decade of loss

What if nearly every single one of your friends were infected with a disease that doctors could barely begin to understand, let alone treat? What if, within months or even weeks, they suffered and died? What if this disease spread to friends of friends, cousins, coworkers, acquaintances, everyone you’ve ever dated or slept with and maybe even to you?

COURTESY OF red flag releasing

Takin’ it to the street: A screenshot from David Weissman’s We Were Here, which depicts the tragedies and triumphs of San Fransico’s gay community in the ‘80s.

We may know the facts and statistics on the early days of AIDS, but in David Weissman’s documentary We Were Here (2011), screening this week at PSU’s 5th Avenue Cinema, he shows us that in San Francisco in the early ’80s this was the reality.

We Were Here is a documentary about a community as much as it is about the AIDS
epidemic. It tells the story of how San Francisco became a haven for gay men in the late ’70s, bursting with art, culture, politics, rebellion and, especially, sexual freedom.

But with the new decade came the onset of AIDS, which infected half of the gay men in San Francisco before there was even a test to detect it. The community responded to
unspeakable tragedy in a way the rest of the country should have: with caregiving, activism and standing at the forefront of medical research on the disease.

The most distinguishing aspect of the film is the way it focuses on individual stories. No matter how staggering the numbers may be, the interviews with five people who have so far survived the lengthy epidemic, and who often choke back tears when talking about friends and lovers they lost, illustrate the shocking gravity of the crisis more powerfully than anything else could.

There’s not a lot of dramatic music or posturing, no montages or lists of statistics, nothing to convince you that you should be moved. Simply listening to these four men and one woman is enough to move anyone.

As hard as We Were Here can be to watch, it is also a film about the best in humanity, presented in the most unadorned way possible. Dan Goldstein, a San Francisco artist who once campaigned for Harvey Milk, tells the story of how his partner died after volunteering to test one of the earliest drugs proposed for AIDS treatment.

Eileen Glutzer, a feminist activist turned nurse, treated AIDS patients in an era of fear when nobody knew how the disease was transmitted and many hospital workers refused to be in the room with them.

Nearly all of the individuals in the film were directly involved in the city’s incredible response to AIDS. Paul Boneberg was one of the founders of San Francisco’s Mobilization Against AIDS committee, and Ed Wolf was a volunteer with the Shanti Project, working as a companion and caregiver to the sick.

We Were Here depicts incredible compassion in the face of terrifying tragedy. The mobilization of the community—from the marches, to the candlelight vigils, to the long list of community organizations and charities—became known as the “San Francisco model,” which set an inspiring example for the rest of America.

Many overlooked details of the history of AIDS in the ’80s are highlighted in the film, including the onslaught of tests and experimental drugs, like the early AZT trials. Ballot initiatives to quarantine AIDS victims and the overwhelming culture of homophobia and fear are depicted as being quelled and defeated by the enormous swell of support for the victims of the disease.

As the decade continued, medical advances began to give patients hope and AIDS activism became more widespread. Still, the feeling that San Francisco, and especially the gay community, existed in isolation from the rest of the nation is ever-present.

Weissman, who moved to San Francisco in 1976, codirected the documentary with Bill Weber. It was presented at the Sundance Film Festival in 2011 and premiered at San Francisco’s Castro Theatre. The film feels distinctly personal—you are hearing these interviews without the filters of Hollywood or politics, with no embellishment or manipulation. This is just what happened.

Through a large collection of personal photos and archival video footage, We Were Here presents a story that many young people today have never really heard, and that’s what makes it important.

When you see the reality of the AIDS crisis, you can’t help but wonder how something so monumental in this country could be so easily forgotten, now that modern medicine has come so far. But the people who lived through it are still telling their stories, on behalf of the many people who cannot.